If you like wooden boat building

[Bruce]

I grew up on 3 different wooden Chris Crafts. While wood is a thing of the past in boatbuilding (never iched for a week cutting a plank of wood) wood craftsman has slowly been dying.
In ditching any regular tv, I started watching a bunch of utube and came across a channel Acorn to Arabella.
It's about two young guys up in western Mass building a 39' wooden sailboat (yes I know sailboats can be a bad word)
One thing I miss about the NE is the craftsmanship that has been passed down generation to generation. In Florida, craftsmanship is non existent.

Check it out. Gives me a bit of hope that everything in the next generation or so won't be stamped out in a Chinese factory.

[PeterPalmieri]

I will check it out. We’ve ditched cable and found some really cool stuff on YouTube.

[MarkD]

Bruce:

I agree with you on that.... Craftsmanship and thoughtful quality have become rare.

Have you seen these guys? Still getting it done after all these years. I see their boatyard a lot in the summer. A flash back to simpler times and quality work.

https://gannonandbenjamin.com/

Mark

[Pete Fallon]

Bruce,
I couldn't agree with you more about the crap on TV. I grew up worth wooden sailboats and my first powerboat was a 16' wood Amsbury dory built by Lowell Boatworks on the Parker River in Amsbury Ma. It had a 7.5 HP red and white Johnson dating myself by the outboard colors(1956). I sailed in Turnabouts, 110's 210's, Stars and Townies all made of lapstreake oak or plywood. I used to go by boat to Graves Yacht Yard in Marblehead a mile and a half by water from my house to watch the real oldtime craftsmen build the 12 Meter America's Cup, Neferetti in 1958. That summer after asking the yard boss's permission to watch how it was built, he said as long as I didn't get in the way I could watch all I wanted. I met John Alden, Ray Hunt Sr., Dick Bertram, Mosbacker and Ted Hood who was a still in his early 20's, just starting out as a sail maker that summer, it was quite an education in wooden boat building. I can still smell the fresh cut oak and mahogany and the odor of Red lead paint and oakum caulking. As a former fiberglass boat builder I agree with you about the lack of good craftsmen and pride in their work help in South Florida. Don't get me wrong there are still good craftsmen around but they are getting fewer and fewer as we get older. My younger cousin is a marine architect and the editor of Wooden Boat magazine in Maine. My grand father sailed on lumber schooners along the New England coast in his early days.
I miss the smells of the old boatyards in New England, they wouldn't give you a head ache after breathing the air. You didn't have to wear a self contained breathing apparatus to lay up a hull, you didn't itch after sanding a bottom and OSHA didn't exist. Those were the good old days. Even though I owned a 1961 31 Express for 37 years I still like working with wood.
Pete Fallon

[Charlie J]

i had 3 wooden boats growing up
15 wolverine
16 Grady
19 Grady
they all ran nice, converted the wolverine into a duck boat
when i was able to hunt

[Rawleigh]

I went to the Wooden Boat Museum in Clayton, NY (Thousand Islands) a couple of weeks ago. Amazing place to visits. They even have old wooden runabouts in water that they give rides in. Well r the visit. I love the thought of wooden boats, but not the reality of owning one.

https://www.abm.org/

[Tony Meola]

Tough to beat the ride on some of those old wooden boats. My fathers first venture into boating was an old Chris Craft Runabout. I believe it was a 56, with an old flat head 6 in it. The throttle was a pull out knob with a cable and the clutch lever was on the floor and stood about 2 ft high. The next venture was a 26 foot Zobel Sea Skiff. Lapstrake hull. Boat rode great.

[Charlie J]

theres a school in Newport RI
that works on old wooden boats very interesting

[Carl]

My first boat was a 1960 something Chris Craft. It was given to me by my uncle. Who, if you know my uncle, of course got it for free as motor was shot, kinda went under for a bit too. He's a mechanic and knew where to get a free motor. Located some free bottom paint and had some left over house paint. He had enough house paint to paint the top and most of the sides...well enough of it to go about half way down, so it was bottom paint on the bottom and half way up the sides.
When the free stopped he found boats too expensive, tried to sell, tried to give away...I was the only taker...

He said it was ready to go...just needed shaft straightened, wheel re-coned, stuffing box repacked, coupling was a bit loose( real loose as in shot) and the steering wheel was locked up, (Rudder shaft was bent, locking in the port). Then seats and stuff...but nothing too tough. I took care of that stuff and got to looking at the paint. It was almost neat...but halfway up the side with green bottom paint. So I decided before going in I had to bring water line back were it belonged.

I started scraping the bottom paint off...the wood underneath was mahogany!?! In my head I was tossed, scrap and repaint the water line...or a mahogany boat. I just wanted to go cruising and get to it fast, redo waterline and put it in was my decision.
So by the end of the day I had scraped most of the entire first side down to wood and somewhere along the way realized it was not a lapstreak hull...just lots of swollen ends and a ton of paint made it look that way. It was looked better already, couple more days all paint that could be scraped off, was scraped off. It was time to start sanding and sanding and sanding, first with an aggressive belt sander, finer to an orbital then came 6 coats of varnish, all with a nice bronze wool rub between coats. Boat looked sharp from the sides...the top was nothing special, not one of the real nicely shaped Chris crafts...so left with white house paint. Sides...bright green bottom with deep varnished mahogony...so nice.
OK, lets get ready to launch...bilge pump and lights wired, blower...all good. Start motor and she kicks right off...but turning the wrong way. No big deal I pull tranny, and oils pouring out. I'll worry about that later. Flip pump on tranny and ask a buddy marine mechanic to look at motor before I put trans back on. He looks motor over...something with the timing cover was wrong...But gave a hand mounting trans, add some oil and start motor. As he looks at motor he's going over things that are wrong. The obvious- nothing is ignition protected...carb needs wedge, and not a marine carb. Distributor has wrong advance, exhaust issue etc etc.
As he's talking to me dads electrician /customer, (owns a local marina) friend Karl comes to the house to pick up a job...he's looking at the boat and making me offers to buy, he has a resort in Florida and been looking for something like this. With that my friend is saying let it go...too much work and money for me...AND he has a customer that has a 19' Bayliner with 6 hours on it...90% of that time was put on by him as he is told to change fluids twice a season used or unused. Guy bought boat for his sister who wanted a boat...but for some reason the 19' Bayliner didn't ride quite as nice as his 42' Bertram. He thought he'd let the boat go for what I was being offered for the Chris Craft.
So when KArl comes out of the house he's asking again, I tell him about motor issue...tells me he could give a crap less, he wants hull and trailer.
My first boat, I never got to put in the water and resides in a resort down in Lake Okeechobee, I took that money and bought a 4 year old Bayliner with 6 hours on it in showroom condition. And that's how it all started...

[Tony Meola]

theres a school in Newport RI
that works on old wooden boats very interesting

Charlie

The Tom's River Seaport and Maritime Society has a wooden Boat festival every summer. My wife's Uncle used to be President of it about 15 years ago. He was heavily into Wooden Boats. They get a couple of really nice wooden boats at the Festival. A lot of work to keep them up, especially in Salt Water.

[PeterPalmieri]

For the record, since you posted this I had went back and watched the older posted videos and weekly have been keeping up with it for the last two years.

[kross1]

Hey all
I have also been watching faithfully for the last two years. It has inspired me to do yet another winter project of redesigning my galley. Always something but I enjoy the work

[Yannis]

Except for the Acorn to Arabella channel you may want to follow a very similar one, “Rebuilding Tally Ho”. Great craftsmanship too.

[ktm_2000]

Yannis - I've watched a few of the Tally Ho episodes

Pete - Been to http://lowellsboatshop.com/ quite a few times, rented the Amesbury dory and rowed on the Merrimack River. I couldn't talk my parents into taking over their garage to build one since I lived in an apartment at the time so I bought a https://stur-deeboat.com/amesbury-dory/ 16' model with a 25hp outboard and parked it in their side yard. That thing was great, could fish the bays all day long on a 6 gallon tank of gas, pounded like all heck in a chop but fun none the less.

[jackryan]

There is still a bastion of amazing wooden boat building and craftsmanship in Florida:

https://www.michaelrybovichandsons.com

I toured several builders in Wanchese, N.C. this summer and the wooden boat building craft is alive and well up there. The prices are well out of reach to the average boater, but there are still some amazing wooden boats being made out there.

JR